Windows 8.1 overtakes Windows XP on Steam

Valve today updated its Hardware & Software Survey for December 2013, and the news is once again very good for Microsoft. Apple and Canonical have less reason to celebrate Steam usage for their respective platforms, but Windows 8.1 is doing great, having now overtaken Windows XP.

Here is the December 2013 operating system list for Steam, in order of biggest to smallest share:

Breaking down the numbers even more, here is how each operating system version fared:

It’s worth noting that it took Windows 8 much longer to hit the same milestone Windows 8.1 did today. It passed Windows XP in March 2013, six months after release. While this isn’t an apples-to-apples comparison, it’s still great to see Windows 8.1 pass XP just two months after release.

In fact, Windows 8.1 was the only Windows version to gain share between November and December. Gamers are by and large moving to Windows 8.1, though Windows 7 will of course continue to lead the way for at least the rest of the year.

Last month, we predicted Windows 8.1 would pass Windows XP this month, and said it would pass Windows 8 “a few months later.” Now that the difference is only 3 percentage points, we’re betting it will happen as soon as January or February.